


The Song of the Jubjub

by Wordwitch



Series: The Hunting Of The Snark [3]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling, The Sentinel (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Sentinels and Guides Are Known, Gen, POV Hermione Granger, POV Neville Longbottom, POV Trevor the Toad
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-28
Updated: 2019-12-31
Packaged: 2021-02-25 21:00:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 20,351
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21545188
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Wordwitch/pseuds/Wordwitch
Summary: Responsible adults also need information. But responsible adults can then act.
Relationships: Harry Potter & Ron Weasley, Hermione Granger & Neville Longbottom
Series: The Hunting Of The Snark [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1131947
Comments: 47
Kudos: 59





	1. I have uttered that sentiment once.

There was a door between the stairs to the girls' dorms and the stairs to the boys' dorms.

There was a frosted window in it.

On the wall beside the door was a directory in gold letters that was now some twenty-three entries long, and alphabetized. Somewhere under the midpoint lay the entry _Potter-Longbottom Alliance_.

Eight young Gryffindors stood looking at it in deep suspicion, while the ninth waited impatiently beside the door. 

They were scattered by a pair of lanky redheads crying "Make way, make way! Carrel users coming through!" The closer one pressed his thumb on the _Weasley Twins_ entry, the other hauled open the door to a small room with a double desk in it, and both entered, closing it behind them.

Everyone looked accusingly at Ron, who cast his eyes up.

"I know, I know, but you knew others would..." and broke off as the eldest of the Weasleys currently at school slid through, thumbed the entry for _Weasley, Percy,_ and floated a small but overstuffed bookcase through the door in front of him.

"Maybe we should go in now? And discuss _inside_?" Ron tapped the _Alliance_ entry and Harry held the door open.

"Oh, now," and "Nice!" and "Lookit all the space," and "Is this? Yes! A chalkboard!" sounded from the various children while Ron stood smugly in the middle of the room.

Nodding approvingly, Neville brought out the small precious folded case from a pocket, set it carefully in the center of the wall opposite the chalkboard, and tapped it with his new wand. Instantly it flowed into its full 6-foot tall, 8-sections wide glory, popping loose a lectern with the Index To The Annals of the Potter-Longbottom Alliance already on it and settling down in front. 

There was applause, and he bowed like a Tenor.

"All right, then, what are the usage rules?" Harry demanded, because of course Harry knew there would be such.

"We can come in any time after 5am, but we will be put out at curfew. We can get in from the common room or from the library. 

"Madame Pince and Professor McGonagall can enter at any time, but they may not view any of the work that is being done. Any of the Prefects, and the Head Boy and Head Girl, can open the door, but they can't come in. They _can_ force us out, though."

"Eject button," muttered Fay, and Seamus nodded.

"Actually, I guess any of the Professors can open the door and force us out too, just they would be doing it from the Library side," Ron mused, looking at the other door. The window in it was clear, showing a view of the Librarian's desk and the shelves closest to her.

"Any Prefect or Professor can see through the window, but they have to set it to our entry to look at us. Check it out, though; we can always see through to the Common Room or to the Library. On the other hand, the directory shows which carrels are in use, so it's not like we could actually hide in here."

"Does the directory show everyone or just Prefects and Professors?" demanded Dean, and the evil grin on Ron's face answered that.

"All right, so we know we can bring our own material in. What about Library materials?" Hermione asked, staring at the empty shelves beside the Library door.

"We check out the material we want to use, and put it on the shelf. The shelf makes a working copy and reshelves the original. There is no magic in the working copy, but on the other hand it transfers annotations to a Research Journal. If we do the annotations the right way, it'll transfer them to the correct one of several Research Journals, right way being to use a marking slip." He handed out the boxes of slips Madame Pince had given him. 

"Unless we check the books out for _ongoing research_, they disappear when the Express pulls out of the station. But then, unless we sign out the carrel for ongoing research, it disappears then too. And everything definitely disappears when we graduate, so we would need to move things before then anyway."

Hermione nodded, and kept nodding, and went to the chalkboard. 

"So we have regular homework," she said scribbling, "we have Alliance business as we decide what that is, and we have Sentinel business." She turned and looked at her friends. "Who wants to help me cart in a bunch of books?"

They went pouring out the Library door, heading soft-footed to the Catalogue Room. 

* * *

Neville tapped the cabinet with his new dark cherry wand, commanded "C_ontentuere_ using someone else's wand," and grabbed the flimsy paper from the Index door, sliding around the table to identify the book stacks he would be hitting, while Ron was dramatically calling for basic materials in Defense and Hermione, Morgana bless her unwavering focus, requested everything on Sentinels.

At the sudden silence he looked up from the table to see drawer after drawer open around the room, parchment slips waving like barley. They seemed to peter out near the far end of the room, the very last cabinet having no drawers open at all. 

Hermione hastily grabbed the flimsy paper and closed the door back. "_Contentuere_ recent history of Sentinels." Drawers slid open in the last several cabinets but one, and after she got that flimsy paper, she incanted "_Contentuere_ beginning training of the young Sentinel," which offered entries back hundreds of years if he was understanding the setup correctly.

He could see her swallow, and even in the closed room she came close to Neville and Ron, the others following.

"Do you think we should make a lightning raid and get everything, or kind of sneak the material a little at a time?" she whispered. 

"Let's look at where they are," Ron muttered back, and they looked at the map at the bottom of her original flimsy. It took only a moment to identify the main areas, which were spread among several languages. The bookshelf labels read_ Fiction and Fantasy_ when they first looked at them, but wavered after a few minutes to read _Guardians and Sentinels_. 

Harry's face twisted into a deep frown. He hissed "Censorship! Come on, Ron! The rest of you stay here and guard the cabinets. Hermione, get some more break-downs." He stormed out, and Hermione asked for several other refinements on her subject, and Fay and Seamus huddled close to Neville. Dean and Lavender went to stand by Hermione, while Parvati examined the Hindi-language shelves, making a few notes. 

In just a moment, Madame Pince was following the boys back through the door, Ron closing it and standing with his back against it, Harry leading her over to the table and pointing at the shelves in question. 

"To my sight they read _Guardians and Sentinels,_ immediately. I would like to bring in my apprentice and another student to check the parameters of the situation."

Madame Pince sounded calm, looked normal, until you met her eyes. Neville shuddered and kept from stepping back, and checked with the others. They looked back at Harry. 

"Don't worry," he urged them. "She won't pick blabbermouths." She nodded at the compliment and went back through the door Ron held for her. 

Fay chivvied the group into a cluster near _Metals, Crystals and Earths_, hissing "No need to call more attention!" She and Hermione and Seamus had their parchments out and were taking notes as the Librarian came and went, low-voiced, with her chosen witnesses. 

Hermione was over at the last several sets of cabinets, tapping one, her command low-voiced and inaudible over the soft conversations of the others. Neville saw her lift a single slip, cast the _affere_ charm on it, and let it get sucked back into the drawer. She came and tucked her hand into his, shaking, and he squeezed it just as Madame Pince returned. 

"My apprentice was able to see the label immediately. Mr Castlelough read it as Fiction and Fantasy, and it did not change for him. Please give me a moment."

The children huddled away from the table by the last cabinets as the fell-eyed witch cast over it. Neville began to see spell-residue, and then realized that it was layering - that Madame Pince was casting layers of spells on the table and not cancelling any of them.

About the fifth layer, they began to interact. 

At the ninth layer, they all twisted, locked together, and became a carmine red.

Madame Pince cast two more spells. They all turned grass-green together, including the table, and she snatched a roll of parchment from the air. 

"Well," she said, taking a deep breath, "that was both subtle and nasty. I have broken the binding, but it will take me a while to investigate what was done, by whom, and the intended and unintended consequences. Before I start on that, though: what exactly are Sentinels and Guardians?"


	2. No materials were to be had.

"Well, Neville's one," Fay answered when it became evident no one else could speak. "I'm going to ask you a rude question, so please excuse me. How old are you?" and she put her ear beside the Librarian for a secret answer. The witch smiled instead.

"I was born in 1950 and attended Hogwarts between 1961 and 1969. I apprenticed with Master Linus Dankworth between 1969 and 1972, and then did my two journeywitch years in Alexandria." She nodded at Hermione's gasp of wonder.

"Master Dankworth recommended me to them, as he had taken his education there in the 1920s before he became Librarian here in 1927, taking over from Master Hugh Burtwhistle. I do not know the particulars of Master Burtwhistle's education, but Master Dankworth mentioned once that he had held the post for more than a century.

"More directly to the point, while both of us had been trained in the evaluations you just witnessed, neither of us performed them during my time here at Hogwarts. I believe," she said, her voice going quite dark, "it had not occurred to either of us. Which, considering that they were taught to us as a preventive measure against politics, presents to me several other evaluations to schedule."

Her dark eyes sought out Hermione.

"Miss Granger, what is a Sentinel?"

Hermione swallowed beside him, squeezing his hand, and lifted her chin.

"A Sentinel has enhanced sight, hearing, taste, touch, and smell. He or she also has an enhanced sense of correctness. When trained in the use of these senses, Sentinels act to protect and aid their communities within the parameters they choose. Many go into military or Muggle Auror work; others become Healers or work as rescue personnel. In the Muggle world, we have enough trained Sentinels that they can choose their own careers.

"I have not yet met a pureblood or wizarding-raised wizard or witch who has ever heard of them."

Madame Pince nodded silently, her eyes fixed on her de-corrupted Catalogue Table. "I am to understand that Mr Longbottom will be in training over the next several years, then. I would recommend that you begin with the basic materials and only acquire the scholarly works once he is secure in his control.

"I shall have to begin acquisitions in this subject once more. Would you be able to bring to me a list of recommendations?"

"Yes, ma'am. It would be my honor."

* * *

_Dear Mum and Dad,_

_Please take the letter below to Sense-i together with money. I will send the owl, whose name is Hedwig, back to pick up things in a couple of days. _

_Hedwig likes bacon, but I don't know what else she might like as a treat._

_Love,_

_Hermione _

_Dear Sense-i Tallek, _

_I am overset. Please send the best most recent primers, acquisition lists appropriate for libraries for books published in the last hundred years, and the basic testing kit. _

_I may have found my match. I look forward to seeing you this Christmas. _

_Sincerely, _

_Hermione Granger_

* * *

_Dear Gran,_

_Please look for a package from me._

_Love,_

_Neville _

* * *

In Hampstead, Doctor Emma Granger opened the door to the back garden and stepped back in startlement as she was rushed by a quiet flurry of white feathers, which quickly resolved itself into a lovely, if unexpected, Snowy Owl who perched itself on the back of a kitchen chair. It blinked calmly at her, hooted once reassuringly, and held out a feathery leg. Dr Granger approached cautiously and figured out how to untie the attached letter. The bird shuffled a bit and settled down, waiting. 

Under a series of _Oh_s, _Oh!_s, and a muffled _Wait please_, Emma read through the very unexpected letter from her daughter and searched out some sliced ham, which she rolled up and offered to the bird.

Hedwig accepted it calmly, and hovered her way off the chair. Emma hastily opened the back door, calling "See you in a few days!" and then phoned her husband. 

"Dan, do you remember last year when we told each other _Now we've seen everything?_ Well, now I have to say that we ain't seen nothing yet."

* * *

In Yorkshire, Mrs Augusta Longbottom called for her personal elf.

"Pity, please bring me the Delivery Box that the Goblins sent. You may set it on a table beside my desk."

"Pity will," stated the tiny creature.

At length, she rose from her contemplations beside the tiled fireplace and went to her desk. Pity had found a perfect table, as she had a knack to do, fitting the ancient Delivery Box from back to front and doubling it side to side. Augusta sighed and lifted the lid, checking the default settings and touching the runes for audible alert and visual alert. She said, quietly, "Pity, inform me if the box lights up or gives a sound if I have not noticed," knowing the elf would hear and obey. 

Neville had sent a book, her mailing box, a pamphlet, and a much longer letter. Augusta sat down, took her 2pm healing and pain potions, and opened the letter. 

_Dear Gran,_

_Please let me know how you are in detail. I am desperately worried about you. I will continue to send you letters by owl, but trust the Delivery Box letters instead as the Alliance believe that there might be interference with the owls._

_The Goblins removed three core bindings, a self-doubt hex, and a contempt curse from me, together with a fairly complex set of jinxes to induce clumsiness. They said that the sources and interactions report would take several days, so I requested that they send it to you through this Box._

_Miss Granger, who accompanied me along with Mr Dean Thomas, has given me permission to inform you that they removed a double-ended low-level general contempt curse from her, together with a self-doubt curse that hadn't really been able to settle on her. In addition, there was a miserable type of redirect siphon on her which would take hold at about the end of second year and which would have mimicked a core-binding._

_Mr Thomas has given me leave to inform you that he had a hex removed that was engendering contempt towards family history and society history. He also gave me permission to inform you that there is a mystery about his birth-father; that the man disappeared long before he was born, and that Mr Thomas' half-blood mother never speaks of him._

_My godbrother had his own evaluation and cleansing together with his best friend, Mr Ronald Weasley, and Alliance member Lavender Brown. He has requested that the Goblins send his results directly to this box on the grounds that he cannot wrap his head around them._

_Gran, all of us had some manner of magical interference, including Deputy Director McGonagall._

_Harry was able to unseal and view his parents' wills. Certified copies of those wills, together with all of the Muggle clothing that came with him to school and the initial health scan report from the Goblins are enclosed in the mailing box._

_Only today we discovered that there was also a set of Confundus and Notice-Me-Not spells in the Hogwarts Library. And possibly on the Librarian._

_When you are done with the contents of this Box, please go read through what the Annals have on Sentinels. It will take a while. According to Miss Granger, who is already a highly trained Guide, I am myself a Sentinel. She has been giving me the basic training for this._

_When you find yourself in a physical and mental and magical position to do so, I charge you as the Longbottom Regent to take appropriate action. _

_With loving respect, _

_Your grandson, _

_Neville Aloysius Longbottom _

_Heir to the Ancient and Most Noble House of Longbottom _

And he signed it with all his names and his title, Augusta mused wearily.

She would need Pepper-Up for this.


	3. Navigation was always a difficult art

Obviously what they needed was a schedule, so Hermione laid out the weeks on the chalkboard one direction, with the classes going the other, and they filled in all the things that needed doing.

Neville added in the scheduled Wizengamot sessions. Seamus added in their extra assignments. 

On another segment of the board, Parvati and Fay listed Questions To Be Answered. 

Hermione twisted her lips, and then said, "I think we can finish off the Wands assignment first, and then use part of that to do our Introductory Essay in Transfigurations. Some of the information we already gathered might be different now that we are un-cursed. Let's go through the exercises with our original wands first, then swap around to every one else's original wands. Then our legacy wand holders can back it up with their new wands. I brought my _Introduction to Good Writing From Essays To Monographs,_ if people want to use it. I really like the outlines it has for various lengths of work, even if we do have to translate from pages to inches. "

"Wait," Ron said. She thought that was fast becoming his favorite word. "There's a _book_ on how to write? I thought we just had to wing it!"

They all looked at him for a moment. 

"Mate, no wonder you hate school," Seamus returned. "There's lots of books on it. Muggle school actually has whole classes on it."

Ron shook in place, then went roaring around the walls of the carrel, eyes wild, waving his hands in the air, while the others got set up. Harry caught him on his third circuit, hands on both shoulders and his forehead pressing against Ron's. After a second vibrating in rage, the redhead sighed, put his hands on Harry's shoulders for a minute, and allowed himself to be led back to the table.

The actual work went fairly quickly after that. 

* * *

Several days after the children had gone off on their Joint Flight, they were climbing back all the ledges from the Eating Cavern to their Residence Caverns, when the thing !rribrr had been fearing finally happened. 

The ledges shuddered under them and swerved, and the upper ledge affixed itself to a place they had not yet come to. 

!rribrr clung to Nnehbell, who had kept its balance very well, and the children sounded at each other excitedly for a brief time. 

Then Nnehbell closed its eyes and inhaled. And as the children became very quiet, Nnehbell cocked its great head to one side like a listening fox.

!rribrr tasted the air, trying for something beyond the odiferous children around him.

Canine! Huge! Magical! He began to sound in alarm just as Nnehbell made a comment to the others, and swept him from its shoulder to the pouch inside its outer skins.

All of the children began sounding alarms together, and !rribrr was actually quite grateful to have the sound muffled. They remained on the ledges, forebearing to mount to the corridor, shrieking alarms to the singing air until elders arrived, several of them pundits. The children babbled at them in vocal terror ... smelling of disdain.

The elders conferred together, then waved their own branches, strewing lightning and ozone everywhere, and the ledges creaked back into motion. They affixed themselves into their normal place, and the children, sounding gratitude but exuding disapproval, finished their clamber to their own caverns.

Yes. Definitely this was not a safe environment. 

* * *

"A dog," Parvati said in flat disbelief, and not for the first time. They were doing stretches in the Common Room, as the Library, and therefore their Carrel, was now closed. Hermione was going to teach them a few yoga positions.

"Big. Dog." Neville replied just as flatly. "Chained, it sounded like, and I have never in my life heard links that large. And we have a farm, so I have actually heard some pretty big links of chain. And it reeked, like the creature had not been walked or been cleaned up after. Which aside from being a Big. Dog! is just cruel, because dogs' noses are pretty sensitive."

"Oh, don't get me wrong, _you_ I believe. That someone decided to chain up a big dog inside a school, _that_ is what I disbelieve," and she actually came over and hugged him! Just for a second, but! 

His eyes followed her back to her spot, but he still heard Weasley Geminae coming up behind them, and didn't jump when they spoke.

This was great.

"Ickle firsties were on the Forbidden Third Floor, were they?" bounced back and forth between the two. 

"No, actually," Dean piped up, "but not for want of effort by the Grand Staircase. It took us right over there, so we all screamed our heads off."

"Including Trevor," Ron snickered. "I never thought I would say this, but that is a good toad," and he flickered a grin at Neville, who had to return it.

"So how did you find out about the dog?" The twins asked, climbing onto the couch and patting Trevor carefully. 

"Smelled him, didn't I?" Neville said lightly. "The whole corridor reeked."

"Heard it as well," Hermione added, seemingly thoughtlessly. "Claws that catch leads to jaws that bite."

"An' us wi'out a vorpal blade," Fay said to Seamus, who dropped to the floor in silent hysterics. They all turned to stare.

"But you didn't see it?" the twins confirmed. "Because we did."

"Right," Parvati said. "Was it a short-hair or a long-hair?"

"Short - " started one twin, while the other said "three -" and they stopped and looked at each other. Ron gave Parvati a thumbs-up for making them stumble.

"It has three heads," said one of them carefully, and wholly without humor. 

"A Cerberus?" said Hermione in disbelief. "And I suppose you will tell us it's guarding the entrance to the Underworld, and Orpheus was sitting in there playing his harp to calm it down, and ... what? You can tell _us_," she said sarcastically, "snakes as a mane, or snakes all down its back?"

The twins stared at her.

"No snakes," one said cautiously. 

"It was guarding a trapdoor," said the other. 

"Which is probably as close to an under-world as we might get here."

"A harp, you say?" They said together. 

Hermione rolled her eyes to the ceiling. 

"Well, you don't look strong enough to squeeze it into submission like Heracles was supposed to've. But he wanted to capture the poor dog, and Orpheus just wanted to get by. Hundreds of stories about Heracles dragging it about, and just three or four about Orpheus, so I guess you can tell what the Greeks and Romans valued!"

"How do you know this stuff?" asked the twins together. 

Neville turned and looked at them seriously. 

"Never let Miss Granger get bored."

"You wouldn't like her when she's bored," chirped Seamus, and he and Fay simply _howled_. Hermione shook her head sadly. 

"Never mind them, they were raised wrong. My parents read me the myths of the Græco-Roman world to send me to sleep. Of _course_ a Muggle's myth is a witch's natural history. But to answer the question you are dancing a Tango all around: No. We're not going. Not even the Grand Staircase can make us. If I ever thought you would ask for advice, I would advise you to steer clear on the grounds of why on the green earth would you go running a maze for some weird grownup's amusement, but please: let me not interrupt your ..." and she looked them both up and down, tiny little wild-curled witch that she was, "fun. All right then! Who wants to be a downward-facing dog?" And they all turned their backs on the twins, vastly amused by the name of this first position. 


	4. That would never agree With the plans he had made for the trip

"This is fantastic," Ron muttered gleefully under his breath, sketching out his next essay on flimsy paper before connecting his quill to the Handwriting Tutorial and slowly writing a fair copy on parchment. Seamus and Parvati snickered at him. "_Thank you Seamus_ for explaining what these are _for_, Great _Merlin_ I was convinced they were punishments!"

"Nah, just proving you understand it in your own skull." Seamus shot him a ferocious grin. "You ... _do_ understand it, right?"

"If you actually understand it, you can explain it," Parvati sang under her breath, "and if you explain it to someone else you will understand it, quod erat..."

"demonstrandum!" all three shouted together, making the rest of the Alliance glare at them from their places around the Carrel table. Neville turned to Harry. 

"You and your _Latin For All Occasions_, Harry I swear." His godbrother beamed at him.

"Their choice how to use it, not mine! I'm done, how you all doing?"

"I cannot believe that we will be done with the whole week's assignments before dinner!" Lavender chortled. 

"Ten minutes warning," Ron called. "No waiting on food, _Hermione_. We gotta set a good example for Harry!"

Harry blinked soulful green eyes at her as she looked up from her book. 

"Um. All right, just let me make a note ..." she scribbled hastily on her Reference Slip and stuck it in the book, dithering for a moment on whether to take it with her or not. To Neville's relief she put it back on the shelf; he admitted to himself that he preferred her attention outside of study time. 

Assignments tucked away in their bags and the bags stashed by the Common Room door, the Alliance passed Trevor over to Neville and went out the Library door, cutting a solid four floors off of their trip to the Great Hall.

As it happened, they were at their table well before the Slytherin first years came in, so they were a bit bemused to find Draco Malfoy and Daphne Greengrass heading for them, Mr Malfoy without his normal companions. Miss Greengrass stepped forward. 

"Mr Potter, your advice was excellent, and I bring you the gratitude of the Slytherin First Years."

Harry, who had hastily swallowed and wiped his mouth, rose to answer. 

"You are very welcome." He was certainly winging it, but the general strategy they had come up with for dealing with the Slytherins was _Be formal, but don't say anything extra._ Harry waited, a welcoming expression on his sharp face.

"We had a personal question for you, based on what you told us. Do we understand correctly that you were not raised in a Wizarding household?"

Harry nodded earnestly. "I never heard of the Wizarding World until Hagrid came to deliver my Hogwarts letter. My Muggle relatives had me convinced that magic didn't exist. Of course, they also tried to convince everyone else that I didn't exist, which should have been a clue," he smiled. _Over-talking, Harry,_ Neville thought in despair - but, wait, this was in line with the other strategy. 

Miss Greengrass gave a pained smile. 

"So, any of the information in the Harry Potter books ... ?" 

"Complete fiction as far as I can make out. Certainly no one ever came to the Dursley house to talk to them about me. At least, not that I ever found out about."

"Your yearmates implied that you were not fed well ... ?"

Harry, with all the courage of their House and evidently mindful of what Hermione had told him, shook back his robe sleeve and rolled up his shirt sleeve. He held out his hand and arm to her, and she carefully took them in her own hands. 

"I see. Will you be able to control your broomstick during flying lessons, do you think?"

"Oh, I'm strong enough," Harry said cheerfully, re-buttoning his sleeve and shaking down his robe-sleeve. "You can't paint the walls and wash the car without strength, and you can't keep out of the reach of my cousin without speed and endurance. It's just, I'm small for my age."

Miss Greengrass nodded faintly. "I see. Thank you so much for indulging our curiosity." She bowed shallowly to him, Mr Malfoy joining her, and Harry bowed back brightly. "Do not let me keep you from your dinner any longer. Fare well." And they were gone.

Harry sat down carefully beside Ron, his face suddenly pale. "Did I do all right?" he mumbled. 

"Mate, that was perfect," Ron declared. "Have some more roast pork and yams."

"Flying lessons?" Hermione asked Neville. "I don't know whether to be appalled or excited! It's such a traditionally witchy thing to do!"

"Did you do gymnastics ever?" Fay asked from across the table. "Or skiing? It's like that. If you try to do it slow, you will hurt yourself. And if you don't try, you will hate missing out."

* * *

The children had become a roiling mass of excitement and anxiety, bouncing up and down the ledges of the mountain, darting in and out of their study chamber and in and out of the mountain, looking up at the empty sky or at times watching Wixen flying about on their long branches as they sometimes did.

At last Nnebell's entire flight went outside together with the flights from the other trunks, and !rribrr finally understood: they were about to fledge. No wonder!

!rribrr wandered off out of the way (and to hunt; House-Elves were fantastic people, but sometimes one liked to do for one's self). He would admit to anyone that he was a protective Toad, but he had watched chick after chick being beaked out of the nest, and the worst thing anyone could do was to upset their already fragile balance in the air.

The children were gathered around the long-branches on the ground, sounding together ... well, politely, at least, if not warmly. They all, every one of them, tasted dubious, and !rribrr considered whether it were about their own capabilities, which was typical for a chick who had not yet left the nest; or if it were about the branches on which they would fly, which was somewhat alarming. 

Ah: it must be the long-branches. There went Rron to the incoming pundit, waving one of its long arms at the branches and the other in the air.

And it _lied_, what could it possibly be lying about? Nevertheless, the pundit took out her personal branch and waved it over the long-branches. 

!rribrr blinked both eyes. Some of those long-branches were glowing a rather distressing color, and it looked like all the Wixen shared his distress, grown and child alike.

The pundit floated away the distressing long-branches, and opening a nearby Wixen structure, waved her branch at the contents. 

The entrance glowed.

She summoned forth an entire hedge-worth of long-branches, sorting them by the presence of the glow, and took enough of the dim ones over to the children for each to have its own. 

Thus equipped, the children attended their lesson with more cheer, and all made it into the air, many wobbling about like any fledgling, and some soaring straight away, drawing sharp calls from their pundit.

The children called to each other, laughing with fairly good cheer among them, and the wobbly ones (including Nnehbell and Rrmyni and Babndr) sped up a bit and smoothed out, and began enjoying themselves also.

Cary and Rron and Deenn had caught on quickly and were swooping about like magpies, as were several children from the other flights. The pundit finally joined them in the air, soaring above them and calling out instructions, and led them off in a cackling flock at a respectable height, away toward the lake and back again, the cautious ones slowly increasing their speed and height ...

What a lovely sight. !rribrr hated to think what might have happened if Rron hadn't lied to the pundit, all those mis-glowing long-branches just waiting to harm the children.

He went over to the pile of long-branches and critically tasted the air.


	5. Those who preferred a more forcible word

When the tubular bell to which Dan had affixed the perch rang, Emma opened the back-garden door to find the elegant Miss Hedwig seated in imperious splendor.

"Do come in," she invited the owl, raising her arm. With a cheerful double hoot, Hedwig swooped upon her and swiftly achieved an indoor perch that Emma had crafted from balsa-wood and steel and stone. The owl huffed, turning her head entirely upside down to examine it, and then extended her leg.

Emma unlaced the tiny hinged piece of wood and laid it on her kitchen table as Hedwig availed herself of the water and bacon affixed to her perch.

The woman opened the piece of wood, which enlarged itself in all three dimensions to reveal its true identity as a box quite large enough to hold what Hermione had requested. 

"Camera, camera," she muttered. How dare Dan be in the middle of a root canal at this very moment! She snapped photos of the owl and the box, pulling the sheets from the Polaroid and setting them aside to develop as she loaded up the box. She snapped another picture of the full box, then closed it and folded it back down to its tiniest size. One more picture and she was ready to re-lace it to Hedwig's leg.

"You let me know if it's uncomfortable or too loose," she told the bird, who seemed to think nothing of standing patiently on a single limb. Hedwig crackled at her encouragingly. 

"One more picture?" And then the white bird was off out the back door again. 

"Wow." And then Dr Emma Granger, DDS, flopped into her chair and gave in to a fit of the giggles.

She hoped her daughter appreciated her efforts. Enough to ask for a repeat. 

Owl post.

Wow.

* * *

_Dear Father and Mother, _

_Enclosed please find a letter from Professor Snape, from the set that he passed among all the first years to be sent along to our parents. He would give no clue to its subject, and you have taught me well the hazards of interfering in private correspondence. _

_I have been diligent in my studies and have looked after Vincent and Gregory to the best of my ability. I do not hold the sway over Slytherin that I had anticipated, but you did warn me of the vagaries of Fate. _

_Fate, in this instance, seems to be an unanticipated pair of polite Gryffindors named Neville Longbottom and Hermione Granger. They have diverted my plans and subverted those who should have been my allies, and nothing they have done can be complained of without presenting myself as a toddler. I was prepared to dismiss them as a squib and a mudblood, but the pair of them have taken firm control of the First Year of Gryffindor and changed everything around. _

_Longbottom is showing magical and political power. Granger is a charming intellectual Fireball. They have caused the Weasley of our year to show both manners and grace, which I had thought was impossible. They have unlocked the power of Hogwarts Library and have given that power to the rest of us._

_More precisely, Harry Potter found the power of the Library and they brought him to the Slytherin table to share it with us, while their fellows were sharing it with the other Houses._

_Was the Catalogue Room a secret like the Sorting Hat, something for each new set of First years to discover for themselves? I have to admit between that and the Carrels, Slytherin is in a much better position in terms of classwork than we had looked to be, and we had looked to be in prime position._

_And in terms of questions that startle me to hold, were you aware that Harry Potter was not raised in the Wizarding World at all, and was not raised in anything like comfort among the Muggles either? I saw his arm for myself, and I have never seen any being that thin, including our House-Elves. He tells us that the books purporting to be his biography are nothing more or less than the sheerest fantasy, which he has not read because of not having known they existed. He knows nothing other than what he is just now learning._

_And the Library is large._

_With all my respect, _

_Your son_

_Draco _

* * *

In the end, it was the Patils that hosted the gathering, politely calling it "tea" and providing a great many Indian treats to go along with the delicate English and sturdy Scots offerings. They managed to acquire Arthur as well as Molly Weasley by scheduling it for a Sunday afternoon; Amelia Bones was curious, Mrs Laeticia Thomas was worried, and Mrs Hortense Brown was delighted to be included. 

Mr Cadence Brown excused himself as being _priorly engaged_, which Mrs Brown explained as coming down with a severe case of nerves at the thought of sitting still for hours in the presence of the Quality, but she vowed to take him a full report.

Tiberius Ogden, who considered himself the very definition of Quality and who would rather sit when allowed, was not questioning his fortune in being included, even though no relation of his was at Hogwarts, nor had been for rising twenty years now.

The Finnegans, being both Muggle and in Kilkenny, had pled travel difficulties, and requested correspondence. 

(The Grangers had also begged correspondence, but by reason of having four unexpected surgeries on the day, the match between Fulham and Chelsea, they said, having become quite suddenly local.)

"I have to say," began Laeticia cautiously, "that my son's reports of his classes have been unexpectedly encouraging. Especially in Potions."

"My Lavender as well," Hortense agreed. "Assignments caught up and all. I was concerned about that trip to Gringotts, though." She trailed off, unsure how to address it. 

Augusta girded her figurative loins, and waded in.

"That would be down to me, I'm afraid. I don't think I've been myself for some years now, and Our Neville has suffered for it. But going off to Hogwarts with his father's wand was the last straw for him, and when he decided to act on it, a welter of things came unraveled. So let me be plain with you all. I have been hexed and potioned to the gills, by no fewer than three separate sources, and I am still recovering myself. Neville'd been jinxed and bound and potioned, Harry Potter has been bound six ways from Sunday, and your Dean sent word even he had the odd curse on him. A very odd curse, it seems. 

"Nary a single first-year Gryffindor was clean except the elder Miss Patil, which adds the question _why not_? to all of the questions _why_ that we have."

She took a fortifying swallow of tea, then set saucer and cup both down decisively. 

"From the reports the Goblins sent, however, I may know another question that might answer it. Pranav, have your girls ever been introduced to any adult British wizards or witches?"

"Of course not," he started indignantly, while Garima shook her head, saying "No, so improper."

"Forgive me my lack of comprehension," Tiberius leaned into the conversation, "but you've allowed them to go to Hogwarts?"

"Not without charming every item of clothing, every item of jewelry, and every salve, lotion, and comb that they took with them we didn't!" Garima stated firmly. "And several of those pieces do not come off unless and until I take them off with my own hands!"

"My charms hold up," Pranav confirmed, "and Garima knows her runework. Our daughters are protected.

"Of course," he added, sitting back. "You do not have the custom of isolating your children from non-family."

"In my case," Augusta said grimly, "it might not have helped that much. My son's paternal uncle was the source of a choice portion of his misery, and I did not notice. He lived with us, you see."

"Not with us, though," Molly said in worried tones. "You said - three separate sources? Only we've only ever had people to the Burrow that we trust ..."

"The boys have gone with me to the Ministry, though," Arthur said somberly. "But I would never have expected..."

"Susan's gone with me as well," Amelia said darkly. "But I think you had something even worse in mind, Augusta."

She could barely think it, let alone say it out loud. 

"I just remember him holding Our Neville in his arms, just a few days after his parents were taken from us, looking into his blue blue eyes and saying, _Well, perhaps he'll be a late bloomer,"_ and she caught her breath on what she _would not permit_ to be a sob. "And two of the bonds on Neville's magical core were placed _by him_, right about that time!" And Laeticia was suddenly beside her, an arm firmly around her shoulders and a handkerchief presented for her use. 

"Him, you say," came Amelia's voice. "Who, Augusta?"

"Albus," she gasped. "Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore, according to the Goblins of Gringotts. Bound my grandson's core and made me forget about all the accidental magic he used to do before the attack. Implied that he would make sure Neville got into Hogwarts regardless, as though that were _his_ doing and not the castle's. Let me imagine that the poor child could barely breathe and walk at the same time, and Algernon Longbottom was at pains to encourage that mindset!"

"No!" Molly was gasping, "no no no no no _why_ would he do such a thing?" - But not really denying that he had done it. The Weasleys well knew the quality of the work done by the Goblins. 

Tiberius had sat back.

"You know, he never has defined what he meant by _Greater Good_," he said gravely. "And I remember all too well what Grindelwald meant by it. But, Augusta," he said, "you said the children were cleaned during that trip to the Bank, how did that happen?"

"Blessed Harry Potter," she answered, pulling herself back together. "He and Neville worked together, and that Miss Granger that Neville thinks so highly of and rightly so, and they funded the exams and the cleanings and raided their Vaults for protective gear and I understand went through the Alley like a Danish Invasion. They were neither one of them going to stand for any of their yearmates being anything but completely kitted out. They found some things they sent back to me," she touched the cameo at her throat, "and forced some things on Minerva McGonagall as well, and also sent some things for each of you - Garima, if you would? Thank you. And for the Finnegans and Grangers. And they went and established a Trust to cover exams and the rest for anyone at Hogwarts who doesn't have a Trust Vault. Sorry, Amelia," she said, able to smile sideways at the witch. 

"No worries," she answered, attempting an Australian drawl and missing by several Royal Miles.

"I'd like to add to that if I may," Tiberius said. "And where is Minerva anyway?"

"She'll be here," Amelia answered. "I can tell you that Hufflepuff is having a similar excursion day after tomorrow, and yes: the House of Bones is also contributing to what they are calling the Trevor Trust."

"Ravenclaw is going on Thursday, and the Patils also shall contribute." Garima poured more tea while Pranav passed the syrup-soaked cakes and the cucumber sandwiches again. Laeticia fussed at Augusta until she took more.

"What about Slytherin?" Tiberius asked, eyes narrow. 

"Saturday. Everyone is getting permission from the parents or guardians except in those cases where they are another danger to the children," came a burr from the door. "Sorry to be so late; Albus was in a mood to talk."

"Are you all right?" Garima came forward to take both of Minerva's hands and led her to a sandalwood chair she had been reserving just for the dour woman. 

Minerva touched her collarbone, where rested an intricate gold and silver Celtic brooch shaped like hounds chasing each other. "I am, yes, thanks be to the Longbottom ancestors."

"Our deep and abiding pleasure," Augusta answered back. Everyone now had something from either the Potter or the Longbottom War Collection, and the relief was profound. 

Her mind was clear and sharp for the first time in what seemed like, and probably was, years.

"We can't contribute," Arthur frowned. 

"Wit beyond measure is man's greatest treasure," Pranav riposted. "Get completely cleared, because we require your mind. You know things we need, and do not think I don't know who the Chess Master in your home is. Molly, you as well as your daughter: we have the defensive measures for you both. Because while Albus is a formidable and unsuspected foe, there are others."

Augusta passed around the analysis the Goblins had produced. 

Tiberius' frown grew thunderous. "Several of these people are in the Ministry - Yaxley is in the Wizengamot! But their agendas are in conflict. What ...?"

"Shacklebolt is one of my people," Amelia said in a cold and towering fury. 

"I know this woman," Garima said slowly. "She is one of the nastiest pieces of work it has ever been my misfortune to encounter, and she works with the Minister. Hortense, I so grieve for your daughter."

"What the children have formed can best be described as a _mutual protection society_," Minerva declared. "I think we can do better. I would like for us to come up with a statement of values and goals that firmly separates us from each and every one of these people, and I already have the first one on my list. Tiberius, you were included because you are a formidable actor and a desirable ally, but if you cross me in this, it will be wands drawn."

The man sat back, swallowing a startled grin.

"Say your say."

"Any and all children, regardless of species, place or family of origin, or blood status, has the right to be given all it needs in order to flourish and become its most perfect self."

Tiberius did snort at that. "You have me: so regardless of whether human or not, regardless of whether the child of an enemy or not, all of them are to be sheltered from," he waved at the parchment of names and spells, "this type of nonsense."

"Goblins and House-Elves and Merrow and Centaur and Werewolves and, I don't know, if the dragons turn out to be sapient. And the children of suspected Death Eaters. And the rawest, most ignorant of Muggles."

They all looked at her thoughtfully.

"Although I am instantly with you on this," said Pranav, "I do feel the need to point out that this would be so far outside of British thought as to be located somewhere in Tibet. We will have enemies on all sides."

"We already do!" cried Augusta, flinging her hand at the parchment. "We are about to _die out_ because everyone is targeting the children! We are _eating_ our own next generation and there will _be_ no more magical world, let alone a Wizarding one!"

"And that's its own worry," declared Hortense. "Do not think it is no problem, every nest with but a single fragile chick in 't, we are going to inbreed ourselves out of existence!"

"There you are, second value," Laeticia stated. "Given that both or all parents are in agreement to the pregnancy, no one else may interfere in that pregnancy. I am aware of a few too many miscarriage hexes and one or two potions to destroy fertility altogether."

"Always assuming that the bearer agrees, yes. I do have a thought to some people who should not breed, but that is what got us here, isn't it?" mused Hortense. "Third value: no one shall be pressured either to wed or to procreate against their own free choice, not by family, not by a suitor, not by diminution of will via spell or potion or any other method."

"Pressured, yes, I can agree with that," mused Pranav. "Garima?"

"Yes," she hummed, "We could still arrange meetings and so forth, but the choice would be with the children. I can agree with that."

"You don't think it would be wise to encourage people to have children? Pass a law or something?" Tiberius inquired curiously. Hortense snorted. 

"They Muggles that Grindelwald were working with, they tried that. It were a mess."

"Hmp, yes, that is exactly what it was," Minerva agreed. "Tiberius, you are of the Old Families, would any of this flout their protocols?"

"Culture and practice, yes. Protocols; not that I can think of at the moment. I'll get back to you if I find anything."

"We have a great deal more to discuss," Garima declared. "However, that must wait until we have digested this much. Does anyone wish a last cup of tea?"

"I do," stated Minerva. "Arthur, Molly, would you wait with me a moment?"

Around them the others gathered cloaks and packages, and bidding farewell, left for the Floo Room. 


	6. You will find I have told it you twice.

After Garima had gently closed the door behind herself and Pranav, Minerva looked at Arthur, then fixed her gaze on Molly. 

"I will be taking the both of you to Gringotts directly we are done here," she stated. "They are expecting us. But I have twa queries fer ye, Molly Prewitt Weasley. And ye will answer me direct.

"The first is: when did ye begin readin' the Harry Potter books to young Ginevra?"

Molly began twisting her hands together. 

"She must have been about three, I think, when we were given the first three books. There was no harm to it, and she loved them so - always saying she was going to marry him when she grew up."

"Who gave us those books, Molly-wobbles? I don't know if I ever knew... " Arthur said in puzzlement. 

"Auntie Muriel gave me a subscription to them for her, Arthur, it was no cost to us," she said in a pleading tone. She suspected, Minerva thought, that there was something wrong in it, but she didn't know what yet.

"The second question is: whose idea was it to go in the Muggle entrance to King's Cross this year, when I know for a fact that your family always comes through the Floo?"

Molly's face crumpled, her eyes darting around the room.

"Albus," she whispered. "Albus came to tea, oh, back in July I think, and mentioned that he understood Harry would be coming in the Muggle entrance this year, and wouldn't it be nice for him to meet a new friend? No harm, Arthur, I swear, such a lovely boy as he was, and Ginny got to see her hero!"

"Molly Weasley," Minerva declared grimly - she had thought she might need to do this since she'd overheard the twins telling Lee about it.

"The Harry Potter books are a complete pack o' lies. Harry has not lived in the Wizarding World since November 1st, 1981. He has not lived with wealth. He has not known who his family was. He has been starved like your family never has been, and it was _on purpose_. 

"Ginny's 'hero' does not exist and never has."

She sat back and watched Molly weep. 

"Ye maun tell yon Ginevra that it is all fiction, and that she is ta learn the difference. It will do her no favors, and it will harm Harry, if she acts as if he lived her fairy-tales. And I will not have him hurt any more than he has been ta noo."

Arthur now had his arm around his wife, his own face milk-pale under his freckles.

"I'll see to it myself," he said. "Harry - who raised him, then?"

"The most horrific set of know-nothing Muggles it has ever been my misfortune to witness, and I say this, ye ken, as one who married a Muggle-born Wizard and loved him _and_ his family. I pled with Albus not to put him there, not to leave him on the doorstep wi' the milk, not to leave him there with only a letter an' a blankie, and," she hissed in her outraged fury, "then he _made me forget_!"

"He really is our enemy, then," Arthur said softly. "To treat any baby like that. And Harry the last of the Potters - that would be another Wizarding line gone."

"That is right," Minerva answered, finally bringing her dialect under control. "And he is too young to be choosing any to marry, let alone the small sister of his best and only friend. Mark you, Arthur: the jealousy hex young Ronald had on him was the most pernicious I have seen since 1976, and the laziness one was foul indeed, nearly invisible as it was and anyone would think it was just how he was. And that was definitely Albus."

"We'll need a strategy," Arthur sighed. "Well, come along, Molly, we have to get clean before we can help Ginny."

And, murmuring a farewell to their hosts, the three Wixen made their way to the Bank.

* * *

"We should go see Madame Hooch," Seamus said as they made their way back to their Carrel from Madame Pince's desk, having taken her the bibliographies and pamphlets that Sense-i Tallek had sent.

"All right, this time I don't follow," Fay said, which was fair, Hermione thought: sometimes it did seem like the two of them shared a brain. 

"Well, you know we have to do self-study in Defense until they get us a new teacher, right?" he offered as he held the door for them. 

"Oh, excellent idea!" Fay bounced, "three free snitches!"

"What." Came from Lavender, Dean, Harry, Ron, and Hermione herself, but Neville evidently got it, and Parvati just watched the lot of them with one eyebrow up.

"Can I smell the difference between a cursed broom and an un-cursed broom, and maybe if we get some upper-years to help, can I smell the difference between a new broom and an old one! Does different kinds of magic have different odors!"

"And to answer your other question, Hermione, the Muggle saying would be 'two birds with one stone'," Dean added, much to her relief. "But the first question would be whether she still has the cursed brooms, so yes! Let's go see!"

As it happened, she did still have them, separated out from the remaining ones, and not only allowed them to work with them, but also taught them the revealing spell she had used.

Madame Hooch even scattered the brooms around in the tall grass, and showed them both the green sparks and the red sparks spells. They had Neville sniff them out and tag them as cursed or un-cursed, and then, while he worked on sorting out whether there were different kinds of spells on the cursed brooms, the rest of them practiced _revelio_ and _Wingardium Leviosa,_ bringing the scattered brooms back to the adult witch.

When she re-cast the spell, they had missed five brooms, so she scattered them with a laugh and sent all of them looking again, Neville working on his _revelio_ this time with them.

"You know," Madame Hooch said as she put away the various broomsticks, "my sisters and I played _Search The Clouds_ before most of us came to school, and both of the spells are for first years. You use the human variant - _revelio hominem_ \- and the Smokescreen Charm, which is _Fumos_, and this is the wand movement."

They all practiced for a few minutes until they had it down, and then she sent them back to the courtyard to play.

Which turned into a four-House mosh pit in Hermione's opinion, but a fantastic lot of fun. 

She kept to herself the thought that the Hooch sisters probably played this on broomsticks. Neither she nor, she thought, Neville was ready for that.


	7. A spot unfrequented by man

The next time the children approached the lair of the Wixen adder, they had one of the elder students with them, who taught them to throw ink with their branches: red, yellow, green in glowing splotches that the male student - boy, if he remembered correctly - then would go around and vanish.

Rrmyni sounded quietly at Nnehbell while the others waited more or less patiently. Nnehbell's face smoothed out from the painful-looking twist it had been in, and it bent its head forward twice, quickly. 

Then Nnehbell went sniffing carefully around the cavern, occasionally marking one thing or another with ink. !rribrr tasted the air, trying to find if he could find the same things Nnehbell was finding. Everything had the ozone scent, but after a while he noticed an acrid undertone to things Nnehbell was marking in red, and a scent like rotting wood to some of the things he was marking in yellow. 

Now, this was fascinating. !rribrr focused, and shortly was able to find things Nnehbell hadn't yet. He waited, and if Nnehbell didn't find what he had, he would sound, soft and open-mouthed. Nnehbell would sniff again, and sometimes it would mark the thing in red or yellow, and once or twice it marked the thing in green, which prompted excited soundings from the other children. 

Nnehbell returned to the cavern entrance to great noise from the others, and an embrace from Rrmyni and Bayy and Babndr. Pabadi and Rron patted it on its other arm-strut, and Deenn tapped !rribrr on his forefoot.

The boy called them together, instructed them in another throwing, and then everyone went around the cavern, throwing at walls and things, and marking the places that glowed. 

Which was a lot of places and also a lot of things.

!rribrr got down and examined the floor, occasionally calling Nnehbell over to mark something. 

The children threw at the things that they sat on, and the things hanging in midair, and to a fair distance up the walls, chattering like a murder of crows. They reached a limit, though, and after several efforts they gathered together in conclave, sounding together at length. Coming to a decision, they put Deenn down in one spot to make an image of the cavern, while the rest went around marking on their skinsheets. 

The boy did not remove the ink when they gathered to leave.

* * *

"Could you check on that dog, Neville?" Dean asked suddenly. "See if it's still there - maybe check on how it's doing?"

They were sprawled around the Carrel, assignments done, Hermione and Neville looking through the training materials Sense-i Tallek had sent and making notes, Trevor off in a corner doing - something - with Parvati. Neville had no idea what, but they both smelled calm, and Hermione said they were having fun, so. And Fay and Seamus were watching Ron teach Harry to play Wizarding Chess and commenting (and evidently driving the chess pieces utterly mad, or maybe that was Harry.) Lavender had been going through Dean's sketchbook and muttering to him, and occasionally casting what was maybe a color-changing charm at one picture or another, but now both were looking at him. 

He glanced at Hermione, who just shrugged and reached out her hand. Taking it, he closed his eyes and began listening for chains or claws or dog-snuffles and whines, imagining his hearing going slowly down through the levels of the castle.

The dog was still there, apparently asleep, so he sent smell to check on its status.

It smelled healthy, which was good, and its room smelled like it had been cleaned recently, which was better. There were some recent bones but no meat, so he? Yes, he, was being fed. Neville wondered briefly if that was the House-Elves taking care of him as he reported on this much, then he dropped his hearing and smelling down from the dog's room, thinking about the trapdoor. There was a room full of a plant - oh, Devil's Snare, huh, it smelled healthy enough; and then a room full of fluttering and clinking, weird, and then - 

Neville cried out, grabbing his nose, Merlin's _linen_ that was nastier than the Defense room! Hermione had hold of his wrists, speaking softly to him, helping him ease off. He didn't want to lose track of where he was, he needed to hear what was going on -

Something _huge_ was stomping around, dragging something with it. Neville held on to the sound to keep him anchored, and dragged in a deep breath of the clean air in the Carrel, with the reassuring odors of his Guide and his friends, and then returned scent to the stinking room. What else was in there? 

The remains of food, about a week and a half old. A mass of leaves and cloth, with a sour-old stench of the being that was in there: possibly bedding. The ozone smell of charms, but he couldn't tell which ones. More practice needed on _that_, for certain-sure!

The room was made of stone; realizing, he ran back in his memory through the other rooms. The fluttery one was stone, but the Devil's Snare was in a wood-lined room.

All right then. He went back to the stinking room, and checked as best he could for anything else. Nothing he could identify, so he cast around to discover whether that was the end ...

No. Another room, also stone, smelling of fire and potions ... and wine? Nothing else in that room. 

And then a great echoing stone room, with nothing in it he could identify. 

And no other rooms around them.

He blinked his eyes open, pulling his senses of smell and hearing back, to find blessed Hermione gripping him with both of her small hands, still murmuring encouragement and instructions to him. He smiled gratefully at her, taking her hands in his own. 

Dean was sitting beside him, scribbling rapidly on a piece of flimsy paper with his pencil.

"Dude," said Seamus incomprehensibly. "That was _wicked_. Just wait until you know enough people to be able to tell _who_ had been in there!"

"Too much strong smells," Neville answered, a bit dazed. "I don't think I could do it from here."

Hermione nodded. "Too great a range in intensity," she explained to the others. "He was using smell and sound to keep track of where he was, and he would have to let go of the more intense smells to find something as faint as human body odor." Everyone nodded in understanding. 

"Another Discrepancy Report?" asked Ron, holding one out.

"Yes," Neville responded firmly and holding out his hand. "The dog seems all right, but whatever the other creature is, I don't think it's been fed recently."

Everyone shuddered. 


	8. A second-hand dagger-proof coat

They returned to the Common Room just a bit later, every bit of work done and even Hermione admitting that the Carrel seats were bad for sprawling in. Neville had talked her out of bringing anything to read, citing the book she'd given him that _utter physical and mental relaxation was crucial to the incorporation of any type of learning_. She had phtss-ed at him, mock-annoyed, but was actually happy he was fussing over her. 

They were making their way over to a set of poufs and squashy chairs when the three elder Weasleys interrupted them, faces set and focused as none of them ever were. 

Weasley Major had a steel cage with a sleeping rat in it.

"McGonagall wants us all," he told Ron, "right now."

His eyes fixed on the rat, Ron begged, "Can Harry come?" and Harry stepped up, ready to help, but the boys were all shaking their heads. 

"Sorry, Ronniekins, strictly family this time," Weasley Geminae said, more kindly than Hermione was used to hearing from them.

Harry patted him on the shoulder and stepped back, and the Weasley clan departed en masse. 

The Alliance bunched together, all relaxation gone, watching the empty doorway. 

"Let's get sat," Fay said eventually, and started maneuvering people into chairs. Seamus helped, wedging Harry in between Parvati and Lavender and shoving a wide pouf under their feet to well-and-truly trap them. Fay put Dean on Hermione's other side from Neville, and then the two of them sat cross-legged on Harry's pouf. 

They looked at each other silently. 

"Well, that wasn't alarming at all," Neville finally said. "D'you think I should try to listen in?"

"No," Parvati said instantly. Neville huffed in apparent relief as she went on, "Setting aside the privacy issues, 'cause Ron deserves to tell us as much or as little as he likes, you would run into the Privacy Wards that all the Heads of House have on their offices, and that is a headache that you do not need. He has his family with him."

"Now if he were alone, that would be different," Harry added. "I don't think any of us should be with a teacher or any adult alone." 

"What?" asked Seamus instantly, grabbing Fay and pulling her into his side. Even as she stiffened up, she leaned against him, and they could all see she looked as bad as she ever had.

"I can't say," she whispered, a whine somewhere under her voice.

Harry frowned. "Can't say now or can't say ever or can't say to us?" he asked, the sternness in his voice not directed at her.

One thing they all had noticed once the Goblins were done with them was that they were curious in a way none of them except Hermione and Parvati could remember being before. That they questioned _everything_. And if Fay still had a binding on her that she _couldn't_ say, not just an awareness that she _shouldn't_ say, then that was something they wanted to know about. 

"I can't say at all, but," she frowned, "this don't feel like it is _on me_, not like those bindings did. It's more like it's _on the information_, if that makes any sense."

"But you are sad, right? What are you feeling?" Seamus asked the top of her head.

"I feel like my heart's been ripped out, and I don't know why," she muttered into his chest. "I can't say because I don't know why now, but I used to know why ..." and she dissolved into tears, which Fay never did. Hermione wiggled out from between the boys to hug her on the other side, and the rest of the children followed.

"You all got to sleep with her tonight," Seamus said to the girls, "because I can't and I would."

"It helps," Harry affirmed. "We'll probably be sleeping in Ron's bed tonight as it is."

"All right?" Lavender asked Fay quietly, and she nodded, still weeping. Dean wiggled out to go get handkerchiefs. 

"I'll be right back," Hermione muttered, and dashed into their Carrel. 

_Why does the thought 'with an adult alone' make Fay grieve?_ she added to the list of questions, right under _Why is there a huge stinky thing starving near a chained Cerberus that is being fed?_ and fled back to the Common Room. 

"We have got to get some way of getting tea in here," she grumbled to the pile as she re-joined it. 

"Or hot chocolate or something," Neville agreed quietly, helping her scoot in. "We could bring food from dinner, but I don't have anything to put drinks in. I'll ask Gran." She nodded, approving the plan, and snuggled.

* * *

It was an entire two days later before they saw Ron again though, and even then only once summoned as a group to a meeting with Professor McGonagall. 

Once Dean closed the door behind him, Professor McGonagall ushered them through another door beside her fireplace, where they instantly piled onto a red-eyed Ron, then silently noticed all the adults who were also there.

"Madame Augusta Longbottom," the Professor began, "please allow me to introduce the members of the Potter-Longbottom Junior Alliance. In addition to your grandson, Neville Longbottom, they include Harry Potter, Lavender Brown, Fay Dunbar, Hermione Granger, Parvati Patil, Seamus Finnegan, Dean Thomas, and of course you remember Ronald Weasley. 

"Mr Potter, Mr Longbottom, in addition to Madame Longbottom, I have present to meet with you Madame Amelia Bones, who is the aunt of Susan Bones of Hufflepuff and the head of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement, Lord Tiberius Ogden, a member of the Wizengamot, and Mr Arthur and Mrs Molly Weasley. You will remember Percy, Fred and George.

"Madame Bones, would you explain the current situation?" As she had been making the introductions, she had also been seating the children and raising the privacy wards, their strength pressing somewhat comfortingly against Neville.

"Let me begin," said the stern woman with the short grey hair and the silver monacle, "by saying that this is incredibly complicated. Please don't expect to understand until I have finished giving you the information, and if you understand then, I wish you will explain it to me." As that made Hermione snicker quietly and relax just a little bit, Neville allowed it. Silently. Since he would never be rude enough to deliver a set-down to an adult.

Plus his Gran would take care of it if necessary.

"Professor McGonagall will have already demonstrated to you the animagus transformation, and explained how difficult it is. She may have also informed you that those who achieve the transformation are required to register with the Ministry of Magic."

They nodded, because she had. 

"It is an unfortunate fact that some people do not comply with that requirement.

"Such was the case with a Mr Peter Pettigrew. Mr Pettigrew achieved the form of a common-or-garden rat during his fifth year of education here at Hogwarts, during the British Wizarding War. He did not register."

Of course, the moment she mentioned "rat" they all looked over at Ron, who nodded at them. 

Oh, disgusting! 

"Mr Pettigrew was among the close friends of Mr James Potter and his wife. During the last days of the War, Mr and Mrs Potter went into hiding with their infant child Harry: yourself, Mr Potter."

Neville reached blindly for his godbrother's hand.

"As the main seat of the Potter Family, Claybottom Manor, had been completely razed to the ground earlier during the war at the time your grandparents were killed, your parents took shelter in a cottage in Godric's Hollow under the protection of a Fidelius Charm. This is a complex spell, requiring a great deal of power to cast, that seals a secret inside of a living person, who is then called the Secret Keeper. Only that person can give the Secret to anyone else."

Harry's hand spasmed around his own, and so did Hermione's.

"James Potter was one of a group of four close friends in his year: Peter Pettigrew; Remus Lupin; and his very closest friend, Sirius Black, who had the distinction of being the first member of the Ancient and Most Noble House of Black to sort into Gryffindor. This apparently did him no favors within his family, as during the summer after his fifth year he abruptly took up residence with the Potters. 

"Thank you, Augusta," she muttered in an aside, taking the offered cup of tea and drinking thirstily. 

"That friendship endured through the end of school, and when you were born, he was named your godfather. I am given to understand that you were raised among Muggles, so you may not know that godparents take a Vow of protection for their godchildren. A vow on their magic." This time she waited for Harry to nod that he understood. 

"When your parents went under the Fidelius, it was widely believed that Sirius Black was the Secret Keeper for your family."

Again she paused, this time to allow the children to accept mugs of chocolate. 

"When that protection failed, it was equally widely assumed that Sirius Black had betrayed your parents to," and they all could see her steeling herself, "Voldemort. This was supported by the very public encounter he had not a day later with Peter Pettigrew in the middle of a Muggle street. Mr Pettigrew asked him why he had betrayed them, and then the street exploded, killing twelve Muggles and completely destroying Mr Pettigrew. Only his finger was ever found of him."

Madame Bones took another gulp of her tea.

"When the Aurors and Obliviators arrived a moment later, they found Mr Black collapsed on his knees in the street, laughing wildly and shouting 'my fault! All my fault!' Evidently they took him precisely at his word and dragged him directly to Azkaban without actually stopping for an arraignment or a trial."

"Hermione," Neville had to whisper. 

"Sorry," she whispered back, and loosened her grip. On his other side, Harry was like stone.

"In a different situation, Mr Potter, I would be scouring the ranks of my Aurors and demanding justice before the assembled Wizengamot and raining down havoc upon the heads of the last administration. But I am among the group of adults that Madame Longbottom called upon to go to the Goblins and get evaluated for, and cleansed of, bindings and jinxes and other such impediments.

"And so I am aware of a finely-tuned Agreeability Charm that had not been placed on me, but had rather soaked into me as a result of my presence in a specific location. I have to accept that others who spent time in that location would have the same Agreeability Charm soaking into them."

She leaned forward, looking to Harry, but then also to Neville and, he could tell, to each of the others. 

"That Charm is in a runic array carved in several different locations in the Ministry of Magic. And it urges agreement with the actions of the Ministry."

"_That_ isn't in the least despotic," Hermione burst out under her breath, but Madame Bones heard her.

"Despotic is precisely what it is, Miss Granger. Its age has been assessed at better than two hundred years but less than four hundred, and we are speculating that it was placed about the same time as the Statute of Secrecy was enacted in the Western World. The issue is that it affects the members of the Ministry and also of the Wizengamot equally as insidiously as it affects the public."

"Meaning," Hermione said boldly, "that there is no one in a position to criticize the institution and its actions, not even the members of the institution itself."

"Exactly." As Madame Bones sat back in her chair, they could see how badly this had affected her - and also the other adults, it was now clear.

"But let us set that aside for the moment, and take up a different thread.

"What brought our attention to the situation was the aftermath of the Weasleys getting cleansed. Because one of the first things Mrs Weasley said to Professor McGonagall as she came out from her session was that Ronald's rat was actually very old. And the first thing Mr Weasley said when he came out was that he could not believe he had allowed a wild rat to be taken in as a pet."

When Neville cast a quick glance at Percy, the prefect was staring at the floor, his own eyes as red as his ears. Because Scabbers had belonged to Percy first as he recalled. 

"And with her own mind clear, the Professor immediately saw a possible reason, summoned the boys with their rat, and called on me.

"I chose to take advantage of that charm, Miss Granger, and had a field office set up outside Hogsmeade. I sent a very carefully selected group of Aurors and Unspeakables to the Goblins with instructions to submit to the process I had established with the Bank. It was autocratic in the extreme, and considering the various enemies that we are facing, it was the only method I could conceive of that would work. Those Aurors and Unspeakables have now taken a Vow of Service, not to the Ministry of Magic but to the Magical Peoples of Britain. And after they had taken that vow, I asked them to accept my leadership so long as I both hold my office and also have not, to their observation, acted against the interests of those Magical Peoples. No vow to support me."

Hermione nodded beside him. He couldn't see her face, but her hand was no longer about to break his.

"I was able to identify a few Healers that I thought could work with us, and personally requested that they submit themselves to the Goblin Procedure, as we are now calling it. They collectively demanded that I make a vow on my magic that their undergoing the procedure would not result in their harming any of their patients, current or future, which was only fair, considering, and I was glad to make it. So now we have some healers."

"Gran?" Neville interrupted. She nodded at him. "How is the Trevor Trust?"

"Untouched by those actions, and flourishing with donations," she answered raspily. "It is now at a point where I judged it acceptable to instruct the Goblins to set aside a percentage for investment."

Neville sighed in relief, and sat back. While this was all well and good, let the Aurors pay for taking care of their own. The Unexpected Ally account was for children. And their parents as necessary. 

"So, at that point I was able to have Mr Black retrieved to 'help with inquiries,' as we say, and he is now in medical care." Harry surged forward, catching himself before he left his chair.

"The pet rat was brought, asleep, to our field office, which was constructed with all its various rooms being proof against animagi as well as various spells that might allow or attempt to force the removal without warrant of their residents. We forced a reversal of any animagus transformation, and lo!" Madame Bones spread her hands. "The late martyr of the last day of the war, back from the grave!"

She looked to the side, her mouth twisting. "The true Secret Keeper. We questioned him and Mr Black separately under veritaserum, warranted jointly by myself as the Head of the DMLE and by Lord Ogden as a senior member of the Wizengamot. Witnessed and recorded as a Certified Document by Unspeakables. 

"Mr Black - or possibly Lord Black, that status is unclear - will remain in Ministry custody in a secondary location, as is permitted by the regulations set down for the running of the DMLE. The fact that he is receiving physical and mind healing and all needful comforts in this secondary location is specifically irrelevant according to those same regulations."

Her grin was more of a grimace, and Neville began to see how distressed she found it to need to take advantage of venal laws simply to have justice done.

"In sum, then: the pet rat was the person who betrayed your parents, and the man who was accused was innocent. They are both now in long-term Auror custody outside Hogsmeade, awaiting a joint trial when their mutual condition allows it."

"Okay," Harry said, his voice hitching. "When can I visit Mr Black?"

The adults looked at each other, seemingly startled. Had they thought Harry _wouldn't_ want to see him? Maybe they needed more healing.

"Amelia, if you would request that his Mind Healer communicate with me when letters might begin to be exchanged, I shall have Mr Potter begin to write. I imagine that a personal visit might then be scheduled, on which I shall accompany him as his Head of House."

Madame Bones nodded. "That sounds like a good plan, Minerva. You understand, Mr Potter, that he is not in good shape?"

Harry snorted. "I think I might be in the perfect position to understand that. I haven't been in very good shape myself."

"Is that all of it, or is there more?" Neville asked boldly. Something about the adults felt like they still had a last cast to make.

"You have a smart one here, Augusta," said Lord Ogden, leaning forward. "I'm here to offer training to Mr Potter in some of his Head of House duties, since everything we were told about his getting trained was a bald-faced lie." For some reason that made him chuckle to himself, but he pulled it together.

"I would like to participate in that, if it wouldn't be a hardship," Neville responded. Let his godbrother go alone to be with this stranger? It would not happen! "And although I don't think the others would be interested ..." he polled them with his eyes, and they shook their heads. "My good friend Miss Granger would be fascinated, and it would please me if she were permitted to come as well."

Bright-eyed, Lord Ogden nodded deeply to him. "If you are all agreed, then I would be delighted. Would noon on Saturdays be acceptable? Minerva?"

"It can be arranged," she agreed, checking with Neville that it was also acceptable. 

"Then let it be done. Minerva, thank you for your hospitality," and that suddenly the meeting began to break up. 

Neville rushed to his Gran for a hug, which she tightened around him.

"Oh my child," she whispered. "I am so sorry, so sorry I was not strong enough." He hugged her hard; he didn't think he could cope with this right now.

"Um, could we have Harry for Yule? And could Hermione visit a day or two then as well? Sorry! Madame Augusta Longbottom, may I present to you my Proposed Guide, Miss Hermione Granger? Hermione, this is my Gran, Miz Augusta."

Hermione, bless her, curtsied with her head lowered! 

"It is an honor to meet the young woman who is training my grandson in his inherent talents," Gran said, using some of the phrases from the Annals, to his pleasure. 

"It is my honor to be of service, and my pleasure to meet his Matriarch," she responded. 

"Certainly you must come for a day or two over the Winter Break, and you must bring your parents if you can. I was sorry to miss them at tea last Sunday."

Hermione made a complicated face, settling down on a wry smile. "It is a hazard of being Muggle, I suppose, that indulging in a passion for sports risks injuries that cannot be as easily fixed as in the Wizarding World. And my parents would never leave someone in need, even someone stupid enough to get into a fistfight over sports!"

"And this is Harry."

To all of their surprise, Gran swept him up in his own hug, rocking him back and forth in a complete abandonment of her dignity. 

"Yes, Yule and Eostre and Summer Break, all of them." She released him, the both of them a bit wild-eyed, and straightened her robes. "I have read through your parents' wills, and I accept the charge on behalf of my son and daughter-in-law. You shall make your home with us from now on. Lord Ogden was able to execute the will in the Ministry as the Goblins did through the Bank, and no one can prevent us now."

They all grinned in secret evil pleasure at circumventing the Unnamable Enemy.

Oh. Neville felt a complete dunce. Bald-faced. Right.


	9. With their boxes, portmanteaus, and bags

Apparently some things couldn't wait. 

Apparently the House of Potter had been without a formal Head for long enough that certain rights could shortly be abrogated, according to things Sirius Black said to Madame Bones, and which she had confirmed with Lord Ogden. 

So a very quiet trip to Gringotts was planned, for just a few days after that meeting with Madame Bones, just almost a week after they had filed their latest DR.

Ron had stayed at Hogwarts with the others, stating that if he was there, most people would assume Harry was also there.

Professor McGonagall had also remained, although Neville thought she was there in a more active role. This might be one of the more dangerous things she had done, and he knew she had fought in both Grindelwald's War and in the British Wizarding War.

Account Manager Snagdrake led them through what looked like the last door, one room into another into another from the mundane door off the hallway they had first entered that led, for most wizards, to the Vaults. The stone here was basalt to the eye and basalt to the ear, no further doors or rooms or halls near it except the one they had just come through, in which the guards remained, forming up around the doors. 

Beside him, Hermione was wearing a faint smile. No treachery, no enmity, not even any cross-purposes, then. Neville looked at Harry where he stood between Gran and a slightly tilted Mr Black, and nodded, and Harry nodded firmly back.

The Repossession Room was laid out in squares, some traced on the floor beside the walls in various base and precious metals, some in glowing stone panels on the walls between those squares, and a nested set in the middle of the floor marked in polished and unpolished basalt. Accountants and Tellers and Runners spread themselves around in a pattern that he left to Hermione to divine, and Account Manager Snagdrake led them all to locations around the central square, Hermione beside Neville, Mr Black wavering beside Harry, Gran beside Madame Bones, Auror Glimlittle and Auror Makepeace and Auror Houton spread among Tellers, Lord Ogden beside a young man named Gravius Branwyk, apparently the current Stenographer of the Wizengamot.

As everyone settled into their places, Snagdrake strode to the smallest box in the middle, turning to face Harry. Quiet before, everyone fell utterly silent. 

"Harry James of the House of Potter, why are you here?"

"I want my stuff back," Harry declared crudely, light suddenly glinting off the carved ruby on his right ring finger. "I want back everything that belongs to the House of Potter, whether lost, or borrowed, or lent, or stolen. I do not want back anything that was given as a gift by a member of my House, and I do not want anything that was sold by a member of my House or at the direction of a member of my House."

"The repossession of the belongings of the House of Potter commences with items that were lost by accident." The ancient Goblin slammed his staff into the floor and clumps and piles of ... all right, Harry had called it correctly, _stuff_, showed up in the outer band. Some was encased in clumps of dirt. Some was obviously broken. Some was soggy. 

Some were beautiful. 

The Tellers banished dirt and water, and floated everything over to one of the boxes against the wall. Harry nodded firmly at them, and looked back at Snagdrake. 

"Repossession continues with items borrowed from the House of Potter."

No dirt or water this time, but the outer band was filled with books and clothing and jewelry and some furniture and an utterly dismayed Abraxan stallion and some piles of paperwork. A Teller caught the Abraxan neatly with an ancient horse-taming charm, and led it to a box by the wall in which a water-trough suddenly appeared.

Other Tellers and Accountants dealt with the rest.

After a swift look at Mr Black, who shrugged in just as much puzzlement, Harry returned his attention to Snagdrake. 

"Repossession continues with items lent by the House of Potter."

So all right, evidently borrowing and lending were in fact different, Neville mused as the outer band filled with money and paper drafts. Tellers swiftly dealt with these as well.

Beside Lord Ogden, Mr Branwyk was scribbling on one piece of parchment while directing several Dicta-Quills. 

"Repossession continues with items stolen from the House of Potter." With this crash of Snagdrake's staff against the floor came simply piles of money and cloth and furniture, plus what appeared to be an actual menagerie in addition to about a dozen more Abraxans, mares this time, and all of the Tellers and Accountants and Runners were in motion, the animals placed into Habitat charms, things sorted out with spells lying over them, hundreds of scrolls of parchment produced and sorted, copies going in all directions. 

The faces on Gran and Lord Ogden were unbelievable in both rage and sheer crogglement. Mr Black just looked resigned, but Harry looked about half a minute from running at the Abraxans.

Neville hoped he could hold it together. 

They weren't done. 

"Repossession continues with beings kidnapped from the protection of the House of Potter and still in captivity."

Hermione forced him into a crouch with his head between his knees, counting breaths for him, as around them Medi-goblins and Healers sprang forth to deal with Wixen and House-Elves and at least two Trolls and a Banshee and some Vampires and three Centaur and - well, he didn't know what all because he was trying not to lose his breakfast.

They all looked hurt.

Harry was asking Mr Black something. The man nodded, and Harry stopped an Accountant dashing by for a quick word. The Goblin also nodded, and went on his way. 

Neville got himself under control. A few minutes more, and he got his sense of smell in control as well, and got back to his feet. 

"That creature near the Cerberus?" he murmured to Hermione, who nodded. "Mountain Troll," and he nodded at the two Trolls over at the side, drinking from barrels of water and resting on conjured benches. Hermione's eyebrows went straight up and she muttered, "Oh that isn't safe at all," and glanced towards Madame Bones. She snagged a Runner going by, gave her a message, and released her.

Madame Bones listened, spoke with the Runner, and then scribbled a note to give to her. The Runner opened the door and passed it out.

Finally the furor settled down, and the Goblins returned to their places, silencing charms over the various containment squares bringing the room back to quiet. 

"Repossession is complete with all other items, belongings, persons, deeds, titles, and information properly belonging to the House of Potter and currently improperly out of its possession."

Three large boats slammed into one whole side of the square, each instantly shrinking only enough to fit as the others landed. They were sodden and barnacled and only some very quick work by some Accountants kept things from sliding out of them.

Neville and Hermione both were so fixed on these unlikely arrivals that they did not see the other things that landed.

Account Manager Snagdrake looked around, gestured to the various attending Wixen, and went to join Harry. They scurried around the square.

" ... fees from the Potter Family Vault," Mr Black was saying firmly, and Gran added, "As Regent for Alice Longbottom I concur." 

"Agreed," Snagdrake responded. "All of the analysis and documentation will be placed in the Family Vault and copies presented to the Wizengamot, the DMLE, the Godparents and the Potter-Longbottom Alliance, as agreed, by 6pm Gringotts London Time."

"My Aurors and I need to return to Hogsmeade," Madame Bones announced. "Lord Ogden, Madame Longbottom, I may need your assistance. Apparently there is a starving Mountain Troll in the dungeon. May we leave the rest of this process in your hands, Account Manager Snagdrake?" 

Of course - Mr Black couldn't be out of her custody, so all the Wixen would have to go. The Account Manager agreed, and had them taken to a Floo nearby, while Accountants and Tellers and Runners made certain that neither the two Mountain Trolls there, nor any of the other living beings who had arrived, were starving any longer. 

* * *

Professor McGonagall was _lit. up._ when she met them at the front gates of Hogwarts, a frowning and unhappy Hagrid at her side.

"Please rejoin your classmates, children," she said austerely, and Harry took Neville's other hand so they could tow him along and keep him from falling while he eavesdropped on the adults behind them.

"O Morgana," he moaned, "the Headmaster kept them from going to get the starving troll!"

"Can you hear the troll from here?" asked Harry urgently. "What's it doing?"

Neville squeezed his eyes shut as he stopped to concentrate. 

"Professor!" he turned and shouted. "It's knocking down the wall!" 

Abruptly a ghostly housecat fled past them, wizards and witches running hard behind, Hagrid almost keeping up with the cat, scattering children as he went. Hermione ran for the courtyard, screaming for everyone to get outside the walls. A huge silvery dog followed Hagrid, pausing every few feet to bellow "Get behind a door!" in Mr Black's voice as students of all years fled past them, including the Alliance. Hermione waved them sideways along the wall toward the greenhouses and the stretch of field where they had dealt with the brooms, away from the straight path from the Great Doors through the Courtyard Gates.

And then they waited.

After a while, Parvati dug Trevor out of the front of her robes where she had stashed him, and passed him back to Neville, and then stretched her arms in front of herself where she sat cross-legged on the grass, resting her head on her knees, heaving a great sigh. Lavender patted her on her back.

After another long while, they could hear some of the upper years try to start up a game of Exploding Snap, but it didn't really get going. 

"Can you hear anything?" muttered Dean.

"Bunch of barking earlier, some growling, now just whining. Hagrid saying 'good doggie'. I think he's taking the dog down the hall... someone pulled open that trapdoor the twins were talking about ... oh good," Neville sighed. "They're pushing the Devil's Snare back with _Lumos Solaris,_ that won't hurt it. Feet hitting the floor ... opening a door ...

"Professor Dumbledore just asked Hagrid why he has the dog in the hall. Fluffy's going to help with the troll ..."

Other students were gathering around them, listening, shushing each other.

"The troll's broken through the wall, but the hole isn't big enough for it to get through yet. Professor Dumbledore has gone into the first room, down thr- ... oh blast! He's burned the Devil's Snare!"

Hermione hugged him, and so did Harry on the other side. 

"Professor Flitwick said something like fin eye tea ... bunch of tinkling crashing. They've gone through the door... Professor McGonagall said the same thing. 

"Professor Dumbledore caught up with them ... he and Professor McGonagall are yelling ... they stopped. 

"The troll tried to come through the hole but it tripped. There's a lot of shouting, spells I think. 

"The troll is quiet... it's still breathing!"

Beside him, Harry hissed _yes!_ and ignored the children around him looking at him strangely. 

"Everyone said _Levicorpus_ together, we gotta learn that one. One of the Aurors said it again ... They're coming back the other way. I don't think they're gonna need Fluffy, but better ..."

"safe than sorry!" the others chorused around him. He smiled lopsided.

"The troll should be able to go live with the other two," Harry said contemplatively, and Hermione nodded. It was a good thought.

If the other trolls had been captured out of Potter protection, then there should be a place they had come from that the Goblins would take them back to. There might be a bunch of trolls there this one could stay with. Maybe Mr Black would know where that was, if he used to live with the Potters. She had a thought - but no, if this troll had been stolen from there, it would have shown up in the bank. 

Neville looked up, transferring Trevor from his lap to his shoulder, where the Toad immediately scooted over beside his neck. "They're coming. Um." He looked around, and Hermione spotted what he was looking for. 

"Hagrid's hut is that way, we're not in the way." He relaxed, and got to his feet. Around him, everyone else scrambled up as well. 

After a while, Professor McGonagall came striding through the Courtyard Gates followed by Madame Bones and Mr Black, two of the Aurors and Professor Flitwick behind them with wands pointed at a floating troll, Hagrid beside them with a three-headed dog on a short leash.

Hermione drank in the sight. The Cerberus was at Hagrid's elbow at its shoulder, its heads at Hagrid's shoulder, looking in all directions. Short-haired, whippy-tailed, its markings like a Doberman's.

The twins had been right: not a serpent in sight. 

Behind them was the third Auror. Floating Professor Dumbledore. Who was unconscious. 

Lord Ogden and Neville's Gran brought up the rear, as grim as could be. 

All around Hermione, the students were absolutely silent. 

Mr Black suddenly went down in a puddle. Without pausing in her stride, Madame Longbottom swirled her wand at him, raising him into the air, and the parade continued. 

Outside the Hogwarts Gates the Aurors and Professor Flitwick wrapped the troll in meters of cloth and lowered it to the ground. The third Auror treated Professor Dumbledore the same way. Lengths of rope were brought out and the ends puddled on them both, and with a swirl of light, troll, Professor, and Aurors all disappeared. 

Madame Bones spoke with the others for a few minutes, then brought out another piece of rope and disappeared with Mr Black. 

Hagrid turned and made his way down to his hut, the three-headed dog gamboling beside him. As they watched, he looped the leash over a fence post, ducked into his hut apparently for his crossbow, and led Fluffy off into the Forest.

The other four came back to where the students all stood waiting.

Professor McGonagall let out a long quiet breath. 

"And that is only one of the reasons why the Forest is Forbidden," she said dryly. "Please join me for tea in the Great Hall."


	10. Breakfast at five-o'clock tea

With the prospect of news, everyone trailed into the Great Hall, finding a lovely Afternoon Tea laid out, sandwiches and sausage rolls and hot buttered toast, scones and what Hermione would call individual quiches, samosas and little fried potato puffs showing up near Parvati.

And of course Trevor's tiny pond.

At some point, the heads of House spoke quietly together, and Professor McGonagall stood up. 

"Please continue with your meal. Now that we are all here, I have some news for you. Some of this has already been conveyed to your parents, and the rest will be sent out later today. 

"It was discovered that various curses, hexes, and other spells have been layered upon our students from a variety of sources, as each of you will have discovered over the course of the past two weeks. Your trips to the Bank should have cleared these from you, and the Bank has offered Hogwarts a protocol for maintenance. Please do cooperate with Madame Pomfrey as she calls you in for examinations over the next school year. 

"Further investigation revealed that parents were similarly encumbered; information on how to relieve themselves of this burden has been sent.

"We are still in the process of identifying the sources of these encumbrances, and either clearing them or requesting that they be cleared as appropriate. Documentation is being kept, and where persons or living beings are identified as responsible, charges are being compiled for the near future.

"At this point we do not know whether any of these encumbrances were at fault in his actions, but Headmaster Dumbledore caused there to be kept in the school at least two XXXXX Beings that needed ongoing care and that were, under normal conditions, hazardous to students and staff.

"He did not change the situation even after one of the staff charged with such care was no longer at the School. 

"When he attempted to intervene in staff efforts to deal with the situation, it occurred to us that he might have been subjected to the same sorts of impairments that the rest of us have been suffering, and so he has been restrained and taken for evaluation and help. 

"The Board of Governors has been summoned, together with a team of Cursebreakers."

Professor McGonagall looked around at them, completely grave.

"I cannot promise you that you are safe at the moment. I cannot send you home at the moment. 

"I can assure you that within the next four days you _will_ be safe, either here or at home. 

"Please cooperate with your prefects, your Professors, the Cursebreakers and the Board of Governors over these next several days as we work to make that so.

"Classes will continue as scheduled, although your Professors may be changed out as needed.

"Thank you for your attention," she finished, sitting back in her accustomed chair.

The Hall devolved into a roar.

* * *

_Dear Son,_

_We were both glad to see you even for a short time before the Board of Governors meeting. Your reports have been edifying, and the information concerning the Longbottom Heir illuminating. You serve both your House and your School with honor._

_As we informed you then, and as I am glad to record in script, we are intensely proud both of your being and of your accomplishments. Please continue to strive against your own personal best, neither resting on past achievements nor exhausting yourself against others' performances. The trout does not fly so high as the red hawk, nor the salmon run so far as the deer._

_While the deliberations of the Board are of course confidential, I can with honor confirm to you that negotiations with the Goblins for immediate Cursebreaking and for an ongoing contract have been concluded satisfactorily for both sides. We have also contracted for ongoing Forensic Accounting. _

_You are invited to share this information as you deem appropriate, together with the statement from the House of Malfoy that a threat to any student of Hogwarts is a threat to the Malfoy Heir and will be dealt with as such._

_Less to be spread area-cast, though you may share with your housemates: the decision to retire Professor Binns was taken when it was shown to the Board that students were being allowed to invent historical events to match their families' political beliefs within their coursework, and that three separate House feuds could be laid directly at the feet of such inventions. House feuds being a danger to House Heirs, the result was not only inevitable but immediate._

_We could not be persuaded that no class in History was in fact a worse situation than the current, and so, while we do urge you to satisfy any item of your curiosity in the Library, the Board is seeking a qualified and effective History Master as quickly as can be done._

_As to the former Headmaster, the last report was that he was resting comfortably under the best care available. Nothing further can be made widely known until after the next Wizengamot, to which all of the Heirs have been summoned. It is generally understood that you will be sharing that information once you have all returned to school, so do plan to take notes that day._

_In as much as your mother and I are concerned, we are as well as can be at present and improving at a respectable pace. Over the Yule holidays we will share with you more information on the state of the Manor itself. _

_And finally to the broomstick issue: for several decades before my own first year, it was a custom among certain groups of seventh-year Quidditch players in all the houses to resupply themselves from incoming first-years. At one point the Black family and its connexions began placing lethal blood-based wards on their possessions, and specifically on their brooms. _

_In one year twelve students, three of them Heirs of Ancient and/or Noble Houses and two others the only offspring of their Families, died in agony._

_The ban on first-year students bringing their own brooms was placed before that Yule break._

_It became somewhat of a game over the next several years to speculate as to why that worked when the previous wards, hexes, and in at least two cases feuds had not, but none of us ever came to a satisfying answer._

_As we love you and do not care to permit any dimwit or dunderhead of the upper years to distract themselves with the thought of possessing your broom, we will not be sending it nor permitting you to retrieve it from home. _

_The Board of Governors may be acting on the school-broom situation shortly, however. _

_With paternal blessings, _

_Lucius Malfoy_

* * *


	11. The proof is complete, If only I've stated it thrice.

"I call this meeting of the Wizengamot Of The Brythonic And Celtic Islands to order."

Neville had met the tiny ancient witch before: Griselda Marchbanks of the Ancient House of Marchbanks was the Head of the Wizarding Educational Authority under the International Confederation of Wixen, and she feared no one and no thing. 

Neville thought about that. Maybe she feared ignorance. That could make sense.

He wondered how the curses had affected her.

"The following persons are bidden and required to be here: 

"Each person currently holding a hereditary seat or sitting as Regent for that hereditary seat.

"Each person holding a seat of honor.

"The Heirs to the holders of the hereditary seats.

"The two Stenographers Of The Wizengamot. 

"The five Aurors Of The Wizengamot. 

"The single guest each brought by the several Heirs.

"The Witnesses currently within the Private Chamber.

"Aurors Of The Wizengamot, please clear all others from the Chamber."

"Surely," shrieked a pink-clad stout Witch beside the man Neville recognized as Cornelius Fudge, "you do not mean to _urkh_!" and she was silenced and carted away, Minister Fudge a great deal more dignified in the wake of the Auror floating her out.

He leaned over to whisper to Hermione, "I don't think 'idiot' is the right word. Do you know the correct one?"

"Normally I would say _bonehead_, but in this case I believe the correct term to be _psychopath_. That ... I cannot believe she was trying to correct Madame Marchbanks! Do you know her?"

Neville shook his head and leaned the other direction. 

"Dolores Umbridge," his Gran hissed. "Good riddance to bad rubbish. A bit too handy with a curse," and she folded her lips together. Neville looked significantly at his Guide: sounded to him like she was one of the sources of _their_ curses.

She raised an eyebrow in acknowledgement, her attention back on the chamber, which was now mostly cleared.

"Set the Wards," Madame Marchbanks was commanding, and a moment later Madame Bones confirmed that the Wards had been properly set.

Harry was a few seats down from them, Ron by his side under a _Quietus_ his mother had cast very carefully: Harry would hear him but no one else would. Susan Bones was across the way beside her Aunt, her friend Hannah Abbott with her. Draco Malfoy was beside his father, Gregory Crabbe with him, and Daphne Greengrass was with her father, her friend Tracy Davis at her side.

Neville clutched Hermione's hand. He would hate to be here without her.

"Chief Witch, all are present who are summoned, and none are present unbidden," declared Mr Branwyk, no fewer than _five_ Dicta-Quills scratching away beside him. At the other end of the table, the Second Stenographer was scribbling away by hand, Neville had no idea what.

"We are summoned on an existential matter for Wizarding Britain. Lord Ogden, please introduce this to us."

Lord Ogden stood, tall, stout, upright - _Never let them see you afraid_, he had said to the three of them at their first meeting. _Stand tall, look people in the eye, make them sure you don't fear legilimency, make 'em wonder if you can do it yourself. You have your pins and what-not to protect you._ \- and stated "Wizarding Britain has been laboring under a series of curses since the establishment of the Statute of Secrecy and maybe before then. The curses have been carved and painted into the walls of our Ministry and the doorways of Hogwarts, and cast at our children for generation upon generation. _Lies_ have been written into our histories and have been the basis of policy, and as a result we are within three generations of _dying_. _out_."

The chamber was silent, some having known this and some completely caught unaware. 

"We have expert testimony as to the engraved curses, and I have seen them myself. We can have them broken and removed within three days, and wards set to prevent any further such curses within seven. That is three days both for the Ministry and for Hogwarts. Wards for the Ministry will have to be placed for the first time, but the wards at Hogwarts merely have to be cleared and renewed, so those should be effective within four days.

"That is simple, easy, quick and clean. It is _not_ the real problem. 

"The real problem is with the attitudes that each of us now carry because we have been trained into them and convinced of them. Each of these attitudes is a _Bombarda_ aimed at our very existence.

"Madame Bones will present the evidence, including the need to conduct a trial. She will question the witnesses under veritaserum and vows of honesty. She has stated that she will entertain questions from the Seats with the assistance of the Chief Witch.

"What we will need to do is make a Vow within ourselves - each one of us _to_ ourselves - that we will value the truth above our opinions. That we will accept truth and nothing other than truth as the basis for policy. That we will only accept verifiable evidence, never hearsay, as we seek that truth. And that our core value, the goal that we all will pursue with the assistance of truth, is the survival of Magical Britain.

"I request that the Chief Witch give us all a few moments to come to grips with that."

Lord Ogden sat down in the same silence, as Madame Marchbanks nodded.

Neville could pick out the people who were surprised and unhappy with Lord Ogden's speech. He could practically see and hear the arguments slamming back and forth in their skulls, as they kept running up against _We are going to die out. We will be gone._

And as Madame Bones took them through the steps of the day, Mr Black's trial, Mr Pettigrew's trial, the actual effects of Voldemort on Wizarding Britain including on those people who followed him, the sources of the prejudices against the nonhuman magical peoples, the reductions in the sources of learning at Hogwarts and probable reasons for them, even the sources and results of the prejudices against Muggle-born Wixen...

As everyone else was paying attention to all that, Neville and Hermione were paying attention to the reactions of the Wizengamot. Who was swiftly convinced, who was reluctantly convinced, who could not be reached. 

Finally Lucius Malfoy requested to be heard.

"Enough," he sneered, "if you cannot see that the survival of your magical house is your only reason for your holding of a hereditary seat, then you have no business holding the seat. It is time for you to relinquish it to your Heir. Or to allow your seat to lapse, if you have no heir.

"If you cannot see that the survival of magical Britain is the only reason for there to be a Wizengamot, then you have no place here."

He looked around in fury. Hermione whispered, Sentinel-soft, "The convert is the most convinced," and Neville could definitely see that on the Malfoy lord.

"If you cannot see that each and every child we allow to be a target brings us closer to the brink of extinction, then you need to be bound such that you cannot pose a direct threat to that child! You have each and every one of you had the spells and curses and jinxes removed from you. It is time to understand. 

"The House of Malfoy herewith abjures, for all time, any idea, any policy, and any magic that has either as a goal or as a process any harm to a child that does not directly enhance the survival of that child." The glow of an accepted Vow settled upon him.

Sirius Black, who had been exonerated as expected, and who had taken the Lordship of his House, leapt to his feet, waited only long enough for Malfoy to nod at him, and raised his wand. "The House of Black herewith abjures, for all time, any idea, any policy, and any magic that has either as a goal or as a process any harm to a child that does not directly enhance the survival of that child." The light of his Vow coruscated. 

Beside Neville, his Gran lifted herself to her feet. "The House of Longbottom herewith abjures, for all time, any idea, any policy, and any magic that has either as a goal or as a process any harm to a child, _regardless of magical status or species or family political stance,_ that does not directly enhance the survival of that child."

Lord Black slashed his wand in her direction, eyes raised to the middle air, and shouted, "What she said! Magic bind me and mine in that as well!" As they both lit up, Malfoy pointed his wand at Gran, echoing the amendment. 

Around the chamber, others were flying to their feet, barely waiting for a previous Vow to settle before making their own, each with the Longbottom Amendment (as Neville was certain it would be called). 

He was utterly certain that this was not how policy was supposed to be made. Not how Wizengamot Sessions were supposed to happen. Harry leaned forward to catch his eye, and muttered_ I didn't expect this, did you?_ Neville shook his head. _I'm going to rub their noses in it,_ he continued, and waited for all the adults to be done.

Then he stood up, tiny and young and so brave Neville could hardly stand it, and around him the adults slowly sat back down. Malfoy nodded to him and went back to his own seat.

Madame Marchbanks gave him the floor. 

In complete contrast to all the loud deep rough adult voices, Harry's was high and sweet. 

"My name is Harry James Potter. I am the last of my father's family." 

Around him there was utter silence except for the scratching of Dicta-Quills. 

"Eleven years ago today, my family was attacked and murdered for politics. The fact that they were in hiding didn't protect them. 

"A whole bunch of children and their families were killed for politics. Or maybe just for fun, I don't know." Neville could hear adults around the room sounding like they had been hit.

"Maybe it's just too much fun to have any old excuse to beat up on someone or kill them. I know my own Uncle and cousin enjoyed beating up on me for any reason or no reason at all, and they are Muggles.

"I know that even Muggles have laws and Aurors and Ministry Officials who will come and protect kids like me from their families if they have any reason at all to think something is happening. 

"I know that every time I asked for help, someone tried to help me, and then they would _forget all about it_. And then my Uncle would beat up on me more for trying to get him in trouble. So I know, now, somebody magical was making them forget, and forcing me to stay with people who beat me up all the time. 

"And I think maybe somebody thought that me getting beat up all the time and not getting fed every day was better than me being killed by the same people who killed my mom and dad and all the other families. 

"There were times I didn't think it was better."

He stopped and looked around at them for a long minute, deliberately letting his pain show.

"My Uncle and Aunt told me that I deserved to be treated that way. That _freaks_ didn't deserve any better. 

"I'm just a little kid. I don't have a vote here, yet, and maybe I will never be old enough to get one. But little kids listen to what grownups say.

"And every time I hear a grownup say 'Mudbloods don't deserve,' or 'Goblins don't deserve,' or 'Centaur don't deserve', or _anything like that at all_. 

"I hear 'Freaks don't deserve,' and I know that grownup is _exactly like_ my Muggle Aunt and Uncle and cousin, and I will know that I will have to protect my fellow freaks. 

"Whoever they are.

"I don't know why some people think that way.

"I only know that us freaks didn't ask for it. 

"I'm glad you took magical Vows not to hurt little kids.

"Please think about the rest of the freaks too. None of us deserve to be beaten up.

"Thank you, Madame Marchbanks."

And Harry ducked in the little bow that Lord Ogden had carefully taught them, and sat down, shaking and leaning against Ron, who wrapped a protective arm around his shoulder. 

* * *

"This is actually very fast work," Madame Longbottom said to them over dinner. Luncheon was a distant memory, and afternoon tea a fond one. The members had decided to stay in session, sending the Gringotts teams out to begin their work and having Ministry House-Elves bring in food and pepper-up potions and archives of Minutes and back-issues of laws and an actual napping-spot. Hermione had seen members designating a proxy and stumbling off to one of the four-posters, transfiguring their robes into night-shirts and vice-versa as they came and went.

"We have found the original oaths of service, and have already agreed on the updates to them."

"So there's not going to be an oath to the Queen in it, then?"

"To the... you mean the Muggle Monarch? We never have, no. They tend not to last too long, except, granted, the occasional Queen, but they couldn't keep the boys alive for anything," Madame Longbottom said, rather taken aback. "We were in some discussions with that one gel, Elizabeth I think? But then she died and her Heir tried his best to wipe us all out, including Master Dee of all people, imagine trying to hang your own ambassador! Terrible! I think a great many of the anti-Muggle wards were invented about that time and it was just a complete mess. Didn't settle down until we passed the International Statute and they brought in those Germans to take over. 

"No, I don't think any of us wanted to be beholden to a system that could just turn on us like that. Imagine if young James had known where we were!"

Madame Longbottom shook her head in remembered alarm, and Hermione shook her own head briskly. Imagine indeed: somehow she had forgotten what complete chaos it had been around the time Hogwarts had been founded, and it was bad enough between the Catholics and Anglicans! Think of having both of them turn their sights on you! Think of having no recourse if you had oaths of obedience to someone intent on eradicating you!

"No, I understand. This, though, is why we need a good History Professor."

"I quite agree, and I believe one shall be acquired shortly. Now, where were we ... oh! Yes! Oaths! So the one Amelia created for her people was quite good, and we'll be using variants of that for the different Departments. And her caveat of not swearing to the Department Head was well-taken. We should be able to bring the Heads through, and then the Departments in turn. Going to have more than a bit of a fight on the staffing situation but Griselda is quite right on that. Yes."

Madame Marchbanks had asked why on the sweet green earth she had to put up with incompetent people in the Ministry when she knew for an observed fact that people graduated every year who knew how to do the work and do it well. 

Lord Ogden had had to get back up and remind people that it was a _lie_ that Purebloods were better employees. And that it was a lie that was less than a century old at that; that it was a _Grindelwaldian_ lie that could be proven by anyone in the Colonies or Far Asia or Africa or even the Russias. And then had sat back with a huff, muttering about bookkeeping being an arcane Muggle-or-Goblin art much like logic, give him a good set of Half-bloods any day.

And then Lord Malfoy had made things much more exciting by rising to state that the three most powerful wizards of the past century were one and all Half-bloods, which was leading him to consider offering a Contract to some appropriate Muggle-born for his own son.

Draco had looked quite green at that, but hadn't said a word. Poor creature. But at least it didn't look like the adults had noticed in the uproar. 

"And we should get through the first cull of the laws by breakfast. We have the agreement-in-principle to toss out all the species-specific laws and rely on cause-of-harm and intent-to-harm, it's just a matter of identifying the specific clauses that might take a small amount of time."

"Mad- um, _Gran_, the spell in the Catalogue Room in the Library is great for this sort of thing. Maybe Madame Pince could help?"

Hermione caught Neville smiling at Harry too: leave it to him to think of such a thing. 

"Maybe she could send for a team of Forensic Librarians from Alexandria?" Hermione offered. 

Madame Longbottom sat back in her chair with a truly _evil_ smile on her face. 

"Elf, please," she said. 


End file.
